Russia to test PAK-FA in 2007 ( Counter to the F-22 Raptors?)

India-Defence & ITAR TASS ^ | June 8, 2005

[Prophet in the wilderness]

You mean,,,, like the BAT/MANTA RAY ( more BAT ? or MANTA RAY ? or Sting ray ? ) looking UCAV's in your post in 23 # ?

[burzum]

What I was trying to say is that the Russians, Chinese, etc., will never be far behind us in military technology while we have traitors who sell our technology to them. The atomic bomb espionage case is probably the most obvious example, but there are hundred or thousands of cases. No matter how much money we invest in military technology, we will still have to invest more in the future. In fact, it is wise to make defenses against our own advances since our potential enemies will have the technology soon afterward. One of the most surprising aspects is how cheap the traitors will sell us out for. Billions of dollars of R&D will sell for $10K to the traitor.

[endthematrix]

"I have noticed that much of our aircraft design ends up in Russia."

Yep. Lots of espionage still occurs. Their theoretical work is very good too..plasma generation etc. I'll add that NASA working with them doesn't help.

[Prophet in the wilderness]

George Patton and Douglas Macarthur were right, when you look at the scope of things in hindsight.

[taxesareforever]

I am in total agreement with you. It is almost as if we make sure that the Russians have the same technology as we do. Could it be that this is the way for our government to keep asking for more and better? I wouldn't be surprised in the least if this was the case.

[endthematrix]

I couldn't agree more. Those two could have saved millions more from perishing under the yolk of tyranny.

[Domangart]

Someone was talking about this on 287 a while back. Apparently there are only a few things you can do with a plane to cut drag. Speed is life so the slicker the thing passes thru air the better. Air is not a state secret.

[Wiz]

What an ugly design

[spetznaz]

Someone was talking about this on 287 a while back. Apparently there are only a few things you can do with a plane to cut drag. Speed is life so the slicker the thing passes thru air the better. Air is not a state secret.

What you are talking about is called Convergent Evolution. Basically where different players (or species) arrive at the same solution (or design) since it is the best for that particular task. This is why all the next-gen UCAVs will look more or less the same, why modern Western tanks all look quite similar, and why formula One vehicles look like clones of each other to the untrained eye.

In animals it is quite widespread, and there are a plethora of such examples.

And my personal all time favorite ....the American Bald Eagle versus the Kenyan Fish Eagle.

Bald Eagle:

Kenyan Fish Eagle:

With that said, it is common knowledge that a bunch of Soviet stuff was stolen US tech. A prime example is the Buran space shuttle, which was derived from the NASA shuttle (the Soviets feared that the Shuttle was some sort of space weapon delivery system, and thus they needed to have one too). But all the same convergent evolution does exist in tech and weapons (the tricky part is deciding what is convergent evolution and what is due to sticky fingers).

[Southack]

"The future is basically UCAV based, with a core of manned fighters for flexibility and guidance purposes (and obviously a bomber force with advnanced stand-off weapons such as the JASSM, as well as busloads of JDAMs)."

I'd modify that somewhat. UCAV's certainly have a big future; they offer new capabilities (e.g. swarms of thousands, long loiter times, the ability to switch "pilots" in mid-air, the potential for radical manueverability, etc.)...but the old tools still have value, too.

Stealth UCAV's are going to be going up against American, Israeli, Russian, and Indian optical anti-aircraft missiles, for instance. What a computer can see, can be hit by a missile...if that "target" isn't too fast, too manueverable, or too high (e.g. sub-orbital).

UCAV wars get away from China's (India's too) manpower advantage, so this new trend is definitely go to cause some intriguing discussions in Beijing.

Likewise, now that American *civilians* are putting themselves into Space (e.g. Burt Rutan), the world's militaries have to start factoring in sub-orbital (perhaps even orbital) combat.

So stealth meets the optical anti-aircraft missile...and fighters/UCAV's have to cope with strike from sub-orbital or orbital platforms from high above, too.

Which is to say that aerial warfare is at one of those periodic high-change times. Manned fighters still have some value. UCAV's have some value. Optical anti-aircraft missiles have value. Sub-orbital weapons platforms have value.

The opportunity for new aerial tactics and wildly different types of air wars now abounds.

...And lets not forget that the U.S. is already fielding ground-based as well as air-borne anti-missile lasers, too.

So we're going through a rapid, hyper-fast "evolution" in potential aerial warfare right now.

You might see swarms of UCAV's, swarms in the thousands, attacking one target from multiple points on the compass, while the target itself is defended by air-borne lasers, manned stealth fighters, orbital weapons, and optically (computer) guided air-to-air missiles, for instance.

Hyper-warfare is going to ratchet up a notch, with the U.S. adding yet another length to our lead in this horse race.

I'm reminded of that time right after WW2 when some press-types were interviewing a German rocket scientist about their great progress in rockets but lousy luck in atomic weapons. One American scientist asked the German "where were your cyclotrons?" To which the German responded "we didn't have any" as he hung his head low.

They didn't have any.

Many, many nations could find out the hard way that they don't have the new technology needed to even be remotely competitive with the U.S. all over again. Not everyone has today's "cyclotrons," after all, and it's too late to go get such technology once the war is over.

[Daaave]

If I am not mistaken, the Russkies ripped off the North American B-70 design, with the Sukhoi T-4. The Soviet SST, the Tupolev Tu-144, was nicknamed the "Concorde-ski," and was a ripoff of the Concorde design. I believe the Soviets made direct copies of Boeing B-29s and also ripped off the U.S. space shuttle design.

Sukhoi T-4

[GBA]

Ping!

[Aeronaut]

[Smokin' Joe]

Hyper-warfare is going to ratchet up a notch, with the U.S. adding yet another length to our lead in this horse race.

It will ratchett up a notch, but if we don't get our feces consolidated we will dependant on foreign sources for critical elements of that technology and be able to be compromised at the manufacturing level.

This is the economic phase of the next (happening) world war, and the Chinese and the environmentalists are tag-teaming us now.. The next time the balloon goes up, it is not completely inconcieveable that the Russians could be on our side.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Thanks. Those are pictures of what I was remembering.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

It is obvious the Kenyans stole our bald eagle design and changing the name cannot hide that fact. :-)

[struwwelpeter]

Cool aircraft. F15: Have you looked at Air Forces Magazine 12/2004? A very interesting article on attemped MiG-25 Blackbird intercepts.

[spetznaz]

It is obvious the Kenyans stole our bald eagle design and changing the name cannot hide that fact. :-)

Yep, and right now I am busy stealing the designs for the Kodiak bear and the Timber Wolf so as to send them back. I was thinking about 'borrowing' the designs for the Spotted Owl, but I decided that would nto be prudent since it would probably include hordes of PETA activists and their contigent of tree-huggers. Thus I'll stick to the bear and the wolf .....and maybe add a couple of Democrat party member specimens (for use against enemies ....they seem to be very effective in disruption, and thus would be vital when sneaked into the governments of rival nations ....I was thinking about taking a crazy specimen like Dean, plus maybe a Kerry specimen so as to study the effects of not having balls and a peewee on a male specimen). ;-D